Thoughts About Fatherhood

If my father looked down on me yesterday, Father’s Day 2014, I think he may have had a few chuckles as he savored the irony of the situation.

Back about this time in 1954, when I was seven, my father and I observed our last celebration of Father’s Day. It happened shortly after my mother walked out on him. We lived in Denville, NJ – a rural suburb of New York City where he owned a printing business. He had left me with my aunt, my mother’s sister, until I was finished with the second grade.

Dad and I in Riverside Park near where we lived when I was a baby. I suppose both of us were quite happy, if not downright joyful, that day.

I vividly remember him showing up in the early evening with a string of cherry lolly pops for me, wishing me a happy father’s day. It was the day before I was about to leave for summer camp. Being seven, I didn’t understand a lot of the things he said that night, but I do know my aunt was furious. I was caught between the two, wanting to please my aunt and also wanting to see my dad because I hadn’t seen him in a while. He may have been drunk. What I do remember about that time was walking out of school the Friday before and wondering what was going to happen to me? The next day, I learned about camp. No one I was related to would be watching me and I was nervous. But by the time Sunday rolled around, I wasn’t in very good shape at all and the obvious tension left me quite sleepless that night. The next day, I left for camp, beginning a five-year journey of a vagabond existence with many schools, many summer camps and even more homes that nearly destroyed me.

From that point on, I do not remember observing Father’s Day with my Dad. I surely must have been with him on many of those days. He saw me every other week. Even as an adult, I didn’t even consider Father’s Day. It had little meaning for me.

And so last Sunday morning, I woke up from a dream from my own fatherhood. I had returned with the boys from a camping trip and they were sunburned and there was hell to pay.

I have no idea why that dream came about but as I woke up I realized it was father’s day. And any celebration would be minimal. When I was married, we went through the ritual of observing the day; usually lunch at a Greek restaurant after church. But it had become mechanical. And after my wife and I separated a few months before Father’s (and Mother’s) day in 2010, it too almost ceased to exist. That year neither son bothered to call me. The youngest wrote something terribly hurtful on his Facebook page. I realized it was in anger about the recent split. But to some degree, it still hurts.

The older son, perhaps realizing what the day meant through the raising of his own child, did give me a call every Father’s Day after that, though sometimes I missed his call and he left me a message on the phone. The younger, was just like me. I suppose he was unaware of the day, or only gave it a passing thought.

I did get a nice call from the oldest and his daughter. And I decided to do something about the youngest, texting him and asking him to call me. He did, and I feel much better about the relationship. We talked about a few things that needed to be said and he agreed to come to my wedding in December. And so I ended the day not nearly as depressed as it began, but also thinking how ironic it was.

I started to think about my father. During his semi-monthly visits, he always endeavored to give me a new experience. We would go to different parks and amusement parks. Places that no longer exist in New Jersey still exist in my heart because of him. Once he hired a pilot to take me up in a small aircraft. It was the first time I flew. In the summer of 1961, he took me to several games at Yankee Stadium. That was the year that Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle put on that incredible home run race and my memories of those days remain vivid. He wanted to buy the “good” seats, but I insisted on sitting in the right-field bleachers so I could be near Maris, my idol. It meant a lot to me. A few years ago, I even bought a Jersey with his number on it. It is both a tribute to my boyhood hero and to the man that helped me live that part of history.

He also took me with him to the civil rights march on Washington. I was 11, and much of what I remember was sitting on a charted bus with his fellow union members. The day was hot and long. I found the speeches boring and by the time Martin Luther King gave his famous “I have a dream” speech, I was beginning to nod. But I did understand that the lives of many minorities were very unfair.

His idea of church was to go out fishing in the ocean. And as I reached my high school years, we shared many a day there. The night before we would roast a chicken to take with us, always with stuffing which I loved. We would play cards the night before and on the boat, I loved to share those moments with him as he told stories of his father, “Pops” who I hardly knew. Pops was senile and died when I was six. It happened just before my parents separated and I wonder if that was a factor. Pops was the only grandparent I ever knew as the others had died before my birth.

Dad was a taxi driver sometime during the depression and was in a horrible accident. His lost part of his left forearm and it was fused into a permanent position where he was able to wear a sling. Yet with me, that didn’t stop us having a game of catch. He would block the ball with the glove in his left hand, then pick it up with his good arm and throw it back. We sometimes went to the lake and skipped stones during difficult times and simply talked about what was going on.

Once, we went for a walk in the woods and he told me that when I couldn’t do something for myself, to find a tool. It was something I never forgot. He also talked about not being able to see the forest for the trees.

There was a time when I was about 17 and working weekends as an usher at the local move theater. He suddenly showed up, paying for admission, to talk to me about an argument I had with my mother. I think it was about me telling school officials she drank too much. It was a long trip, taking the subway, tubes and train from Manhattan where he lived. It was something I needed, not because the problem with my mother was anything I couldn’t handle, but because I knew he loved me and cared about me.

As an alcoholic, he developed liver disease. It killed him after about 8 years. One weekend when I was visiting him, I had food poisoning. He was throwing up green bile. We teased each other saying I was puking out my butt and he was shitting out of his face.

I was in the Army when he died. I came home for the final days and visited him several times. He was senile and didn’t recognize me. And I felt a sadness that I would learn no more from this wonderful teacher.

My thoughts about him could be summed up by the fact that he did much with what little he had. I hope someday my kids will feel the same way about me.

Catching Up In About 2200 Words

It’s been a while since I’ve put keyboard to MS Word and written and I hope there are still some people out there who care about me. So here goes. You’ll have to wade through about 2200 words. Sorry I had to “broadcast” this.

As most of you know, I spent last summer in the Dakota Badlands at a tourist trap called Wall Drug. In one way or another the family who own it account for the income of more than half of the town of 800’s population. They hire lots of summer help – about two hundred people – mostly foreign students whom they house in dorms or RVers like myself. Local motels and nearby stores also hire seasonal help.  I will be heading back there for the summer en route to Oregon in the autumn.

After a freak blizzard that dumped about four feet on the town on Oct. 4^th, and closed Interstate 90 for five days, I managed to pull out of my RV spot and begin a journey back east. I did leave some water hoses and a sprinkler under a snowdrift and I hope it will still be there when I return in a few weeks. I do have a bit of anxiety as the store’s general manager, a wonderful gentleman, passed away after he hired me for this summer.

In October, I spent several weeks in New Jersey visiting friends but things did not go according to plan as I had hoped to make a relationship with a former girlfriend something permanent. I did get to spend some time with Matthew. I continue to be impressed by how he has grown and matured and became self-supporting. I also renewed friendships with some high school classmates, Larry, Pete, Lois and Emily, and friends from the Port Jervis region, Donna and Barbara, where I lived for a couple of years after my marriage to Rosemary ended. And I managed to once again visit my friends Jim and Carol in Western Virginia. I had hoped to go to Maryland to see my cousins and Bill, my boyhood friend. But to do so would add nearly 800 miles and I just couldn’t afford it.

And so I drifted to Campbellsville, Kentucky to work for Amazon for November and December. It was very tough work, packing merchandise for ten hours a day and six days a week. But the trip east cost more than I anticipated and I needed the money.

I then wandered into Georgia for the winter. Now the last time I wintered in Georgia, the temperatures rarely dropped below 50 degrees and the highs were usually in the 70s and sometimes 80s. Hah! That was along the Atlantic Coast about a mile from the Florida border. I wound up volunteering at a state park campground in the Blue Ridge Mountains in a year when North Georgia had a record cold winter. One night it was 3 degrees above zero, but the winds gusted to 30 mph. It was cold, frequently wet and generally miserable. I talked to many local old timers who told me that it was the worst winter since around 1980. Because the water would freeze in the hose connecting the water from the pump to the trailer, I had to shut it off and was without water for about 10 days in one stretch. I had hoarded some bottled water and got by, boiling my dishwater.

My arrival was one filled with problems. First I slipped into deep Georgia red mud while trying to park the trailer and had to be towed out. I was so rattled that I then hit the utility box and the resulting loss of electric and overflow of water lasted a couple of days. There was about $3,000 in damage to the trailer, but it was mostly labor and I only had to spend about $150 for parts and did the repairs myself. The insurance company was instructed to pay the bank, so the loan on the trailer was cut in half and I expect to pay it off nearly three years ahead of schedule.

But I survived, though I spent about three times more than I budgeted for propane, as my electric heater couldn’t keep up with the cold. Atlanta, which is about 90 miles southeast of us, had two major ice storms (we had some ice, but mostly  a few inches of snow) that shut down the city. But I had a near miss as many snow laden trees came down, including one that landed a few feet from the back of my trailer. What is minor to a damn Yankee is a catastrophe to a Redneck. A fellow volunteer, Cindy, a woman from the Pittsburgh area who also spent three months here, and I would laugh at people slipping and sliding.

We would occasionally share dinner and we went over to the park’s lodge and watched the Super Bowl, but it was so lopsided that we both went back to our trailers by the end of the third quarter. Cindy also had a dog, a very lively young border collie, and we sometimes walked the two together. But after a mile or so, Pup would become wiped out and “Muffin” (as in ragamuffin) was just warming up.

I did spend time with my friends, Frank and Gina, during Christmas and later in March. They live in North Carolina and getting off the road for a few days was wonderful. You don’t know how much you miss a tub bath until you haven’t had one in nearly two years. But you learn to live without. It’s been an exciting time for Frank and Gina. Their son Marc proposed to his girlfriend Christmas Day and they have spent much of the past few months setting up a thrift store to benefit autistic adults.  The store not only raises money, but its real mission is to train their client base in retail functions. The store is the dream of their daughter, Nicole, who teaches autistic children in a local public school. She won the state’s “autistic teacher of the year” and it was a major factor in getting seed money for the project.

One thing I have lived without is television. I’m up in the mountains and I don’t get any reception. Of course, there is no cable either. But if you have Dish Network, which I can’t afford, they have a receiver for you. The lodge has Internet. So about once a week, I go over to watch the latest NCIS. I finally broke down and got a Smartphone so I could hook into the Internet with my computers and try to keep current with e-mail and Facebook. I like the weather app and use it daily. But I am not at all happy doubling my phone service fees.  Meanwhile, I bought a lot of $5 DVDs at Wal-Mart.

I’m on fairly high ground, which is a good thing as springtime flooding has been a problem. We had about three inches of rain over a 30-hour period a few days ago. But high ground also means low water pressure, especially when the campground is full as it has been since mid-March. I generally use the public showers (low ground) since there is rarely enough pressure to have more than a trickle.  I know they are clean because I spend five days a week cleaning and disinfecting them. That’s how my blue jeans became filled with bleach stains and I’ll toss them when I reach my next stop. The hippie look doesn’t quite work when you’ve reached you mid-60s and are bald.

This state park is different from the other state parks in Georgia. It has a 100-room lodge plus 60 cabins as well as the 100 or so campsites. The lodge is the key. It was losing tons of money so the state contracted out the management to a company that specializes in resorts. But the deal was for the entire park. This happened about a year ago and as word gets around that the only thing volunteers do is clean bathrooms, they are cancelling. In mid-February, a couple visited the park to scout it out and cancelled. Another couple never showed up so after Cindy and Muffin left, I was left to do 15 bathrooms a day. In one way, this is to my advantage. I’ll stay until around the 25^th and get to my next assignment in the Badlands with a couple of days left to relax. I won’t be spending nearly what I expected to in camping fees. My route passes through St. Louis, so I will get to see the Gateway Arch, something I am anxious to do. Otherwise, it’s just a lot of Midwest interstate highways. My route will take me through a little bit of Kansas, leaving Arkansas and Oklahoma as the only continental states I’ve never visited.

What makes up for it is the wonderful scenery. Nearby is Anna Ruby Falls. It is where two fairly large springs merge near the top of a mountain and provide a spectacular view.  As spring is finally here, the leaves are starting to come out as are flowering trees.

The nearest town is Helen. Several decades ago, the town was an outstanding example of rural Appalachian poverty. But the town fathers turned it into a German-Bavarian-Alpine themed town and it has become quite a tourist trap. A few weeks ago on a sunny Saturday, a car broke down on a bridge on the town’s main drag. It took me nearly an hour to get through the eight or so blocks that comprise the many souvenir and antique stores, not to mention lots of German restaurants. Even the one that features Mexican food has an alpine design. Like any tourist mecca, prices are high. Gas is often 40 cents per gallon higher than over in the next town, Cleveland. The autumn foliage is glorious here and weekend traffic jams along the 90 miles from Atlanta are legendary.

I was a pretty sick puppy for almost a month as my blood sugars went out of control. I could barely get up and function. Gradually they went down, but it was a scare. I had symptoms similar to the series of strokes I had in 2006. There was a lot of trembling and inability to form words. The real “cure” was simply to get up and move. But it was so hard at times. I guess it bred some depression, which often accompanies me in the winter months when there is so little sunlight and I am generally isolated. It was a little better this year because of working for Amazon.

I continue to photograph what I find. And I have begun exhibiting my photos. The park gave me an “artist-in-residence” show at the lodge over the Valentine’s/Presidents’ Day weekend. I also exhibited at a Dogwood festival arts and crafts fair a few hundred miles away at the end of March. While I didn’t make much money, I managed to basically break even and learned a great deal about what sells. Much to my surprise, my best sellers are not the spectacular scenes, but photographs of country barns. I’ve shot a number in upstate New York and rural Kentucky and there are several here in Georgia that I am now working on. Alas, I passed through some of the best examples of aging barns in West Virginia on my trip to Kentucky. But the roads were so narrow and mountainous, and the weather so foggy, that I didn’t dare stop to take any photos. I lose a lot of great shots while travelling because it is such a problem to pull over when hauling a trailer. My next exhibit will be at the annual buffalo roundup at Custer State Park in the Black Hills of South Dakota. More than 50,000 people attend this event and much of my work is of the region as it will be my third time there. 

So anyhow, that’s what is going on with me and I hope you will take the time to share something of what is going on in your life.

Artist or Optimist?

I am a damn good photographer. No brag, just fact.

I got that way because I understand three things about how lenses work: perspective, depth of field, and angle of view.  When you understand these three things, you can be a damn good photographer too.

Last year I toyed with the idea of selling my photos at craft fairs and street festivals. When I was volunteering at Oregon’s Memaloose State Park in the Columbia River Gorge, there was a cherry blossom festival in The Dalles, a small town with a large history – it is where the Oregon Trail ended. The region is a huge cherry growing area and they have an annual festival attended by thousands. But this particular street fair, run by the local chamber of commerce, demanded vendors have liability insurance. And the only policy I could get was for $3 million at a cost of $350 for two days. I simply couldn’t afford it and was also rather peeved. I was selling photos. How much insurance did I need for a potential paper cut?

But I started making 8x10” prints, several hundred, of my best photos. In the autumn, I found myself in the Port Jervis, NY tri-state (NY-NJ-PA) area and a friend was involved in a local craft fair. For $20 I couldn’t go wrong so I set up a booth. And made $2.50. The fair, located in a bad location with no advertising, was competing with a major craft show at a local church and a film festival across the river.

While a financial flop, it gave me some ideas of what did and didn’t work. Staples has an annual sale on large format photos and I had about 20 made up. I showed them to friends in New Jersey and they gave me some advice about what sold. I also spent Christmas with a friend in North Carolina who exhibited at a local artist co-op gallery. Looking at how he set up his photos and how other artists worked their exhibits gave me some ideas about presentation.

I am currently in Georgia’s Unicoi State Park and Lodge, located in the Blue Ridge Mountains. They have an annual Fireside Craft Show that is supposed to be a big deal, but they do not permit photographers. However, the folks offered me a “visiting artist” exhibit on the Valentines Day/Presidents Day weekend. The weekend featured a country music concert on Saturday night and the lodge and campgrounds were heavily booked.

But the days before the exhibit were brutal as a major ice storm paralyzed Atlanta, where most of the people were coming from. And while the roads were clear and easy, the people reacted in typical Southerner fashion – panic. More than half the lodge reservations were cancelled. We were expecting a full (50 sites) campground but only 4 RVs showed up – one staying beyond Sunday morning. The show, which had expected to draw about 150, got around 75 people. I estimate that about 50 people actually viewed my exhibit. I made around $100 in sales, some of which was on Sunday when I knocked things down to half price – my cost. The locals also stayed away from the Sunday buffet, a popular after-church venue. I suppose they also wanted to take time to rest following the storms, which mainly dumped snow in our area but also felled hundreds of trees  – one large pine tree missing my trailer by about 20 feet.

Setup from my visiting artist exhibit at Unicoi State Park in Georgia

Further problems involved Wal-Mart. I purchased fifteen 16x20” frames and about half of them fell apart when I tried to put the pictures in them. At $18 each with tax, that was a potential $270 loss. Even those that held together when I mounted the photos had problems. One fell apart when a customer picked it up and another simply fell off the wall after the clamp ripped off the back. Following the show, I had to return the entire purchase, much of it in pieces. I was too afraid to keep the intact ones.

Things were much worse for the servers in the restaurant. Customers, and thus tips. were very few and I suppose I can consider myself lucky. All I really wasted was time.

But I continue to learn. Perhaps the most important thing was that my photos are really, really good. Many of the people who saw the exhibit asked if they were my photos. They were so good that people thought I was selling stock art. Another important lesson was that there is a story behind every photo I took and I enjoyed sharing the stories with customers.

I have one photo of the dam at Speedwell Lake in Morristown, NJ – my hometown. I shared how my father and I used to skip stones along the lake. I also mentioned that Samuel Morse, who developed the telegraph and invented Morse code, had his lab across the street. Stories about Oregon, the Dakotas, Yellowstone, and, of course, Unicoi, came easily from my lips.

Speedwell Lake Dam in Morristown, NJ a photo many people asked about.

The optimist in me says I made about $2 per person and if I did a large show, like the one in The Dalles, it might work out. And so I am now contemplating one last show before I leave Georgia. At the end of March, there is a Dogwood festival at a small town in the southern part of the state that features a craft fair. It’s supposed to draw around 4,000 people and they will probably be in more of a buying mode. I’ve asked a friend in Florida who does woodturning to consider sharing a booth with me and they offer camping for only $5 a night. I will focus on my 8x10”s and sell the 16x20s for $10 each, slightly above my cost, simply to get rid of them. There’s also a one-day show in the South Dakota town I am spending the summer at and I have lots of local photos from there.

And so I proceed on, still thinking that besides being a damn good photographer, I just might be an “artist.’ Though the words “starving,” “struggling,” “unknown,” and other adjectives continue to remind me that my optimist side may be way off base.

What in God's name are we doing?

Brothers and sisters, I’m here to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ today. So let’s get out your Bibles and follow along. But first a few words about today’s topic.

There is sweet satisfaction in the Gospels. Forgiveness is something we all need and knowing that a heaven awaits us, though a matter of faith, is something we can truly look forward to.

So why is it, my friends, that so many of us are tormented? Why is it that we are constantly at war with our neighbors who don’t agree with us? I’ve been spending a lot of time in the “Bible Belt” lately and everyone goes to church. Yet I see little of the love of Christ. The point of this entire message is right here at the beginning. The things we are doing in Christ’s name are poisoning us: physically, emotionally and spiritually. And so my topic for today is:

What in God’s name are we doing?

Now some of us have a collection of Bibles that we rarely look at. That includes me sometimes. But today I’m going red letter only. What does that mean? Some Bibles print in red lettering what Jesus actually said. So we’re going to enter the Red Zone. In football parlance, the red zone is the most important area of the football field. If you get within 20 yards of your opponents goal, you should be able to score. Those teams that do are the ones that win championships. Those that don’t may play the game, but like many of us fall far short of our goals. 

Let’s look at what type of a man Jesus was. He made it clear that the people who were low in society were high in God’s kingdom. Turn to Matthew, Chapter Five, also known as the beatitudes. 

In verse three he says if you are poor in spirit, you are blessed. It does NOT say if you are poor, you get the kingdom of heaven. I am poor in spirit. I have doubts at times. I look around at the hypocrites in the church and say if these so-called leaders are so great, who am I?

Blessed are those in pain, the mourners. And blessed are the meek, not the loudmouths who proclaim the Gospel and rip to shreds those who disagree. And blessed are the merciful and the peacemakers. 

And then he gets to where the heart of the matter is today in verses 11 and 12. “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me." 

Let’s look at this very, very carefully. Many say this is about people who advocate Christ. But ‘because of me” has a double meaning there. How about those who are persecuted by those who advocate Christ? How many times have fundamentalists torn Catholics to shreds? And why? Because of what they believe Jesus says is slightly different. And what is the result? Ask the Irish how extreme this can get.

And then there are those who are so-called “sinners” who have no place in the church. How about those who are divorced, for example? Or those who give in to extramarital sex?  In verse 31, Jesus clearly says if you divorce for any reason, you are committing adultery. And he says it in every Gospel. And what have men, and women for that matter done with the verse? Some have become brutal to their spouse, beating them both physically and emotionally. And then the men say that the women must obey them -- without realizing they must obey Christ. For this verse has no good without a closer look at Jesus actions.

Now let’s move over to chapter four of John’s gospel. This chapter is often called “the woman at the well.” Jesus travels to Samaria. At that time, Samaritans were considered the dregs of society by the “righteous.” He asks a Samaritan woman for some water. He asks for her husband and when the woman says she doesn’t have one, he tells her she is correct. She has had five husbands and is living with another man she is not married to. He talks about the time when Samaritans will be equals with the Jews and uses her to spread the news about him throughout the town. He uses a woman – some would call her a whore – to bring news of salvation to an entire area.

How would we Christians greet such a woman today? Would she be welcome in our churches? She certainly would be feared. Because we are so wrapped up in other’s sins, we don’t look at ourselves.  Back in Matthew Chapter Seven, Jesus says not to Judge others, lest we be judged in the same way. He goes on to say we should not take the speck out of someone’s eye when we hypocrites have beams in our eyes. 

And what did Jesus do when he encountered and adulteress? In the eighth chapter of John’s gospel, the priests drag a woman who was caught in the act up to Jesus. They tell him the law calls for her to be stoned to death. And they demand to know what Jesus thinks they should do. He bends over and writes something in the sand. And then he tells them he agrees with the law. And he told them to go ahead and stone the woman. But, the first stone should be thrown by someone without sin. One by one, the priests turn away until there is no one left but the woman. Let’s look at the dialogue between the two starting with verse ten:
Jesus straightened up and asked her: “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
“No one sir,” she said.
“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now, and leave your life of sin.”

And yet we continue to condemn others, and our judgments of them have resulted in us being judged. There are extreme fools, filled with hate, visiting the funerals of those who have fallen in combat. They say it is God’s judgment for their sins. And the entire nation not only condemns their actions, but also condemns the entire faith. Our Holy War with Islam runs much along the same lines. We have warred with innocents because of the extremists, and we are suffering their wrath. It is a never-ending cycle of hate. 

But what does Jesus have to say about this? Let’s go to Luke, Chapter Three, Verse 27:

“ But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn the other one to him also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.”

Yeah, there it is again. Jesus goes on to say it matters very little about loving those who love you, or doing good to those who do good to you. He says when you lend money; don’t do so expecting to be repaid. 

That’s some radical stuff isn’t it? If you did that, you might become an outcast in your own church.  But in the kingdom of God, you would be honored. 

Let me share a little something from my own life. The ex had a problem with the neighbors one day. And though our children remained best friends, the adults rarely spoke to one another except in harshness. At that time, I had a minivan. And our neighbors had cut down a tree and cut up the branches so the garbage men would pick them up. But for more than a month, the tree remained on the curb. One day, I was going to the town dump to get some free compost. This is the same place where fallen trees went. I told the neighbors I was going there and asked if they would mind if I took the tree over? They looked at me with something of a dumbfounded look and agreed. I hauled the wood away and after that, relations eased considerably. 

It wasn’t much. It was simply a good deed. But imagine if everyone did some small deed like that to someone who they were having problems with? Would our nation be plagued with so much internal rage? 

In Matthew, Chapter 23, Jesus preaches about the religious leaders of that day. He calls them hypocrites, snakes, and says they are condemned to hell. He ends with the following words: “For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’ “

And so I say to you so-called Christian leaders who preach the gospel of politics and vengeance while telling your followers to expect Jesus’ return at any moment. Not bloody likely.

Now go back to the Bibles you thump at sinners and learn what it really tells you to do.

Can I get an amen?

Bureaucracy Strikes Again, And Again

Since I was in second grade and taking instructions for my first communion, I began to suspect the unpardonable sin they talked about was bureaucracy. Of course, I have now lost all suspicions and take it for gospel.

Those who know me and read this and my website know that I have had some troubles with my trailer since arriving in Georgia. First, the unit got trapped in about two feet of soft southern mud and had to be towed out. Then, rattled by the incident, I swiped the utility stand as I pulled into my campsite, doing some minor damage to the trailer.

I did not realize at the time that towing the rig out of the mud had furthered some water damage to the floor. It is now sagging and I worry about it collapsing. I learned the floor is made out of particleboard instead of plywood.  Why? I haven’t a clue. Particleboard warps far more quickly. The trailer is supposed to be “ultralite” and particleboard is also much heavier than plywood.

Top, the path where my trailer got stuck in the mud. Bottom, damage to the front storage door. 

Geico, my insurance company, sent an adjustor out to review the damage. And of course the water damage is not covered. The adjustor offered me about $3,000 to have the damage repaired. His estimate for parts, however, was less than $200. I made a decision to have him send the check to the bank to pay down the loan and I would do the repairs myself, which have been mostly done.

In the meantime, I went to a local RV dealer to order replacement parts. I spotted a used trailer that was far superior, though eight years older, to my present home.  He visited my campsite and said he would take my current unit and $3,500 for the one he had.

Now that was earlier this week. I had been in contact with my bank since December 30 trying to discuss my options. We stopped talking when a blizzard hit Long Island and I hadn’t heard from them since. I have been leaving messages all week, even e-mailing the department manager, without getting my calls returned.

In the meantime, Geico did not yet send the bank the check. I called the adjustor and he told me I would have to call Geico. After talking to five different people at Geico, they transferred me to the adjustor’s office. And, of course, I got a voice mail instead of a human. I was rather vexed and after some screaming, I got a call back the next day and eventually the check was sent to the bank as of today.

In the meantime, I reached the bank and talked to someone who was not handling my application. In essence, the deal was they would probably approve the loan, pending receipt of the check from Geico.

And today, I went to pick up the final part for repair and to make a deposit on the unit. The RV dealer called and said the part was ready around 10 a.m. I was at the dentist and told them I would be there after my workout at the Y, around 3 p.m.

I went into the dealer and said, “ What paperwork do I need for the bank to buy the trailer?” And I learned it was sold only a couple of hours before.

And so, because the insurance company didn’t send the check on time and the person handling the application didn’t return my calls, I lost the trailer.

Naturally, I am pissed. And I intend to read the riot act to the bank tomorrow.

But the fact is, I put the trailer issue in God’s hands the night before. About a quarter century ago, I was trying to get back to college but hadn’t enough money. A woman in a 12-step program told me “if it was meant to be, it will happen.” And since then, when I’ve become rather resigned to that philosophy when things tend to drive me crazy. In letting go, I also let go of a few concerns about the trailer I wanted to buy. The main issue was it was a 2003 model. Things like water heaters are destined to break down. And while the trailer had far more living space, it had less storage space. So it wasn’t meant to be.

In the meantime, the bank will tell me next week how much I can be financed on an RV after they get the check. Perhaps something better is in the future, or nothing at all? Maybe it’s time to get off the road and settle down?

But bureaucracy is still the unpardonable sin.

Amazing Amazon

“Work is a necessary evil to be avoided.”

Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain)

My father was a working man. He drove taxis, owned one of the first White Castles (where he worked 20 hours a day), was a printer and a stripper. Pause – A stripper is a printing job where negatives are stripped together to make a plate. It’s pretty much no more with the advent of computerized publishing.

Anyhow, he urged me to avoid, at all costs, “honest work” – backbreaking labor jobs.  And so, like Mark Twain, I became a writer; not nearly as good, but good enough to earn a living for most of my life.

These days, I write what I damn well feel like. And having avoided “honest work” for decades, I was completely unprepared to endure it in my 66^th year.

For the past few years, I have grown a beard and dressed in red sweatshirts and a Santa hat. This year was different. I became on of Santa’s helpers, so to speak, working for Amazon, the giant on-line retailer. I spent most of November and December at one of the company’s distribution centers in Campbellsville, Kentucky doing very, very “honest work.”

Top: Outside of huge Amazon warehouse in Campbellsville, KY. 

Bottom: Camperforce Logo, which is on Tee shirts and other items Amazon gives it campers.

Amazon, like most retailers, hires extra help for the holidays. They have a special operation in Kentucky, Kansas and Nevada called “Camperforce.” They discovered that full-time RVers are excellent employees who have excellent attendance and are more concerned with the quality of their work than many temps. And so they not only pay you to work for them, but also pay for your campsite at a local RV park.

Going in, I knew it was going to be tough. They said I could be walking ten miles or more during a ten hour shift, never being off your feet except during breaks. There was also a lot of lifting involved. I had been walking three miles daily all summer and I thought I was ready for it.

But Amazon knows its business and they spend a couple of weeks “hardening” you. You spend your first week in a combination of training and then working at your assignment for five hours a day. That is followed by seven hours the next week before hitting the ten-hour/five-day work schedule. And while I was not happy with not earning the money I expected the first two weeks, if they hadn’t done it that way, I probably wouldn’t have made it.

I wound up packing single-item purchases, usually toys and electronics, and it is incredible how Amazon has perfected its work stations. All orders are on computer and as you input the item, it tells you the (usually) correct box size. An automatic packing tape dispenser is at your station and it will provide you with the right amount of tape for the box size the computer calls for. There is also a small printer for packing slips and you place a bar-code sticker on the box and scan it to have it addressed at the next station along the way before being shipped.

This is no small operation. The Campbellsville plant has miles of walkways and several tiers and it will put out more than 200,000 packages in one ten-hour shift. And it’s not even close to being Amazon’s largest distribution center.

Anyhow, we are encouraged to keep moving faster. In my first week, I was doing around 35 to 40 packages per hour. I was up to around 63 on a good day; though as fatigue set in over the course of the prime-time packing activities, I usually did around 55. Many of the people who work here year round can easily do 90 packages per hour. The other day, we had some people from another department help us. The person who worked opposite me was doing 78 packages. I guess the main reason is because they are simply younger and have better endurance than we workampers, most of who are retired. Almost every day, there are contests for packers, with the top ones getting everything from coins for the vending machines to gift certificates. I won some coins and was pleased to get a $5 Kroger gift card. 

By the time we hit mid-December, three weeks after “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday,” shipping was non-stop. Earlier, we had periods of light activity. But mid-December is when the shipping is at its highest. People are ensuring delivery in time for Christmas and the work just doesn’t end. You end the shift with, seemingly, as much work as you had when you started it. The plant stops running for an hour while the day shift (6:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.) leaves and the night shift arrives.

The Camperforce team’s social dynamics also changed. As we began working, breaks and lunches were lively and chatty. But towards the end, everyone was dead tired and we often just stared at one another. There were some days when I just wanted to quit. I was exhausted. But I also wanted to keep my word and kept it up. I did go home a couple of hours early one day because I simply couldn’t stand up any longer. But most of us picked up after we got word when our last day would be. While we were obligated to be available until the 23^rd, the last day for most of us was the 19th. Just after we left, there were major problems with FedEx and UPS and many packages did not arrive in time for Christmas but Amazon had nothing to do with it. 

I had expected to lose weight during this experience. I actually gained a few pounds! It was a result of all the lifting I was doing. I was building back muscles I hadn’t used in years. But it was a very good thing. My left knee has no ACL, the result of a high school sports injury about 50 years before. It is stronger than I can remember. In 2004, I suffered a number of neck, shoulder and arm injuries in an accident that left me quite weak. I am very optimistic about this. I was unable to throw a ball overhead or swim crawl or butterfly strokes without pain. Now I am hopeful I can do so.

But I still agree with ole Sam and I’m going to avoid this type of work for a while, until next holiday season anyhow. I wonder if the same thing happens to Santa?

Morning in a new locale....a VERY bad day

Dec. 22, 2013 – 9:00 a.m.

It’s going to be an interesting few months.

I am back in Georgia for the first time. My previous ventures have been along the coast via I-95. This time, I’m about 50 miles below the western North Carolina border at Unicol State Park, which is located near a small tourist trap town named Helen. I will be wintering here through the end of March when I plan to take a one-month Southeastern sojourn en route to Wall, SD where I will again spend the summer.

It is about 9 a.m. and I arrived last night in darkness after a terrifying trip over a mountain with incredibly tight turns. It was at night, raining and fog was dense. The curves were sudden and sharp and, filled with too much caffeine to begin with, trying to maneuver a trailer both up and down the mountain became a constant series of getting too close to the edge of the road and a rollover and suddenly finding myself in the middle of the road with oncoming traffic.

Normally one would find road signs warning of the curves. But it was dark and I found few. I finally realized my GPS was showing me where the curves were and I used it to help guide me down the mountain with great care. My top speed was perhaps 15 miles per hour.

When I arrived at the park, I went to the lodge to check in. The lodge is a very nice place which is also the local wedding and business meeting venue. I checked in and then went to the section of the park where I would be staying.

The two campground host sites are at the start of the camping area and, fortunately, one of the hosts was there and welcomed me. There are two problems with my site. First, it is a back-in type rather than a pull through. I am not very good at backing the trailer in. In fact, I’m horrible at it. Second, to make things worse, the location of the electric and water system is at the very front of the site. But all RVs and trailers have their electric and water lines at the rear. I suspect I am going to have to buy an extension cord – a very expensive proposition for a 30-amp line. I’ll wait for that and use a standard 15-amp line until after Christmas, as I won’t be in the area for a few days as I visit my friends for the holiday.

And since it was so dark, I simply pulled in instead of backing in and connected my electric. And so, as the rain continues, it remains dark this morning. I look at the road with a bit of trepidation as it is narrow and there are trees on the other side. I say to myself: “self, you got in here last night so you should be able to get back out.”

I’m going to wait until it gets lighter before attempting to do so.

I look out my window and see the mountain I came down. It is not as large as the Rockies, but it is certainly large enough. And I realize that either my damn fool luck continued or angels were guiding my path. In this case, I’ll lean towards the angels.

So the tasks for today are to back in and then set up the trailer. That’s more work than it sounds like because things tend to fall down when you are driving. A tight turn, for example, can mean your food pushes too hard against the cabinet door and it opens, spilling things. Fortunately, the jar of spaghetti sauce didn’t break open. I also have to unsecure and set up a number of items.

After that, I’ll head into town. Helen is a small town that re-invented itself as a Bavarian village. It hosts various festivals and during the autumn foliage season is packed with visitors from Atlanta.

Dec. 22, 2013 – 7:30 a.m.

Did I mention I suck at backing up?

The site is large and after a few tries, I was able to back the trailer back on the road, which is quite narrow. And so began my efforts to back it up. I really don’t know where to start. By that I mean on the road. And even after 3 years of trailer living, I don’t know how much to turn the steering wheel.

And so, low on gas anyhow, I tried backing in several different times. There were poles on each side of the site, road signs, etc and I managed to miss all of them. On about the fifth try, I finally got the trailer in the exact angle I wanted, and the back wheels of the trailer slipped off the road. The rains, nearly constant for the past 24 hours, turned the ground into mud and as one of my tires went off the road, it skidded and jackknifed. 

About the only thing preventing the trailer from going down the road and smashing into the trees is a small stump. This is a possible problem as it may be an issue in getting towed out.

I called my insurance company, which includes road service and they are sending a truck out from a town that is around an hour away. That was about an hour and a half ago. If this is not a state maintained road, the insurance company says, I’ll have to pay for the tow. And just the other day, I paid off the credit card. They’re also bringing some gas, which I have to pay for.

Anyhow, at the moment, I’m waiting and waiting and there is a zombie next to me. He isn’t really a zombie, I think, but he is tall, lean and gaunt with a fairly large goatee. He has dark shadows under his eyes. He looks like something out of a horror movie or, this being the south, (name of movie), He is in the maintenance department of the park and he has to wait for the truck to arrive.

Did I say my stint here was going to be “interesting?” Every fiber of my being wants to flee and head for the coast where it’s warmer and I know the people there.

Dec. 22, 2013 – 3:43 p.m.

Did I mention I suck at backing up? Well how about driving forward?

Yes, the tow truck did arrive and yes I was pulled out safely without damage to the truck or trailer and yes the insurance covered it. So I drove around the loop back to my site and I asked zombie man to help me back up. I couldn’t do it.

And so, giving up in frustration, I went around the loop again and pulled into the site. Clipping the water/electric line with the trailer.

Naturally, the trailer was damaged. In fact, so was the chain saw I had used to remove a stump that was in the way of the tow. The door to the storage area was completely destroyed and the post that holds up the awning was ripped off and so I had to spend more than an hour reporting the claim to GEICO. The lady who took my claim had to read off many things to make the claim legal. The result of this is I have to call a number for an RV specialist in Macon tomorrow. So I sit here in near darkness (the rain continues to pour and the sun is beginning to disappear) with no water or electric.

A trailer has three energy systems. The first is standard electric. The second is battery power, which will enable lights and a few other things, but not the AC outlets that include microwave, television and other appliances. The third system is propane gas, which powers the stove and, when electric is down when travelling, the refrigerator. So dinner is going to be something out of a can cooked in a pot that won’t be cleaned. The dog is fine with everything, just laid back and accepting what he can.

But the lack of power also means I can’t recharge the phone. Hopefully I the people will make repairs, but they have been working on this in the rain for hours now without even getting it shut off. And it continues to darken.

In the meantime, the maintenance people are working on fixing the leak. The water is filling up the hole where the damage is as fast as they can pump it and they can’t shut it off. I took my hose and added it to the drainage. Naturally, someone ran over the tip and so it is no longer useful. My other hose is in the storage area, behind the crushed door. I just realized that the tools to put the jacks down and release the safety chains on my hitch are also there. That means I will have to finish the destruction of the door, meaning that I can’t unhitch the truck from the trailer.

I have just made a decision. I’m turning the lights off, having a bag of peanuts for lunch – way overdue and not good for a diabetic. I am going to take a nap. Perhaps it will be over when I wake up.

Did I say my stint here was going to be “interesting?” This is just about the worst day I’ve had on the road. Will someone please explain to me why I decided to leave my comfortable apartment for this life?

Dec. 22, 2013 – 5:00 p.m.

After more than a few anxious moments trying to find an adaptor, I have power back on a limited basis. I have been able to jury-rig a line using standard 15 amp current, the kind in your home, to the neighbor’s power line. At least I won’t have to spend the fast-approaching evening in darkness. My laptop, telephone and ipod are recharging. It is not too cold and I can heat the trailer with gas instead of the portable electric unit I usually use.

The water is finally shut off, but the maintenance crew has now gone off duty. Repairs won’t be completed until the morning. It is inconvenient and really smelly in the bathroom as I had to take a dump.

I was able to break open what is left of the storage door and get the tool I need to unhitch. Hopefully, the morning will bring some calmness.

I am presently eating a cheese sandwich with some juice. Having not eaten all day, my blood sugars became low. And a side effect is intense anxiety. It’s sort of like a major caffeine overdose. I feel myself starting to calm down as the food starts to enter the bloodstream.

I hope to be on my way out of here before noon tomorrow as I will head north, minus the trailer, about 350 miles to visit friends in North Carolina for Christmas. It will be a good time for me as I enjoy being in a house instead of a trailer. I will not be alone and am looking forward to, of all things, a long, long, long tub bath. RVs do not have bathtubs and I haven’t soaked my body since last March when I was doing so every day at an indoor spa at the campground where I was staying.

With all that has happened today, I am doing a re-evaluation of my lifestyle. I have to ask myself if I should stay on the road or find a permanent address. Much will depend on what the adjuster decides. The last time I had minor damage, in the same area in fact, the vehicle was totaled. This was because the wood floor would rot if repaired. I have no idea of what will happen next. If it is totaled, I will have numerous options.

If not, I am pretty much stuck in this lifestyle. I continue to regret my decision to trade in my 2006 pick-up for a new model. The payments on the truck will run another four years and, at the moment, there is not much equity in it. So if I get rid of the trailer, do I also rid myself of the truck?

If I choose to stay in one locale, it would mean getting a far less expensive vehicle in order to pay rent. And it also means an end to the workamping I have done recently. I only took home an extra $7,000 doing this, but it enabled me to pay my travel expenses. When I was in “Geezerland,” the 55+ apartment complex in Port Jervis where I lived, my expenses exceeded my budget. I would have to find something part-time.

Anyhow, this is something I will need to consider only if the trailer is totaled. In the meantime, it is dark and the rain continues to pound on my roof, making it seem like the inside of a drum. It should lull me to sleep as I watch a movie on the laptop. How about that old favorite “Goodfellas?” I can watch someone else have a bad day.

December 23, 2013

4:30 p.m.

It took an entire day to get power. I was supposed to head north to spend Christmas with friends in the morning, but could not until I got power. I couldn't leave without it because it will drop way below freezing and I needed the electric heater to keep the trailer warm enough to not freeze pipes. 

Around 2 p.m., water was restored. And when the people working on it turned on the power, the entire box fried and they had to replace it. By the time I got power, the water appeared to be percolating out of the ground. They tell me they won't turn the power off. 

So after all day, I took off. I needed gas and paid about 20 cents more per gallon in the tourist trap town than another five miles away. After a 330-mile drive, through many country roads as well as the Interstate, I am with my friends -- in a real house -- with a real bathtub! I am wondering why in God's name I want to go back?

Merry Christmas everyone.